Territorial energetic and environmental planning provides operational solidity to the concept of sustainable development, in particular in energy-related issues, where recent attention to and social awareness of climate change are driving actions and policies at local and international levels. The goals of the United Nations Agenda 2030 can be reached through the strategy of glocalization, giving more responsibility to local administrations like municipalities. In this work, a scientific methodology is developed and validated to revise Sustainable Energy Action Plans (SEAP) and the monitoring phase of municipalities. The methodology starts from measured data in the territory considered and makes use of specific statistical models in order to estimate the needed data. The methodology considers the energy consumption of the main sectors: residential, transportation, tertiary, and commercial, with a particular focus on municipal competences (public lighting, urban transport, municipal fleet, etc.). Renewable energy is also considered due to its importance in local energy production. In order to go deeper into SEAPs, in this paper, the authors describe the quantitative analysis of the Baseline Emission Inventory, the quantification of the SEAP planning actions, and the definition of the Monitoring Emission Inventory, which is the final step of the planning process. This step was done for nine municipalities of the Abruzzo region with different characteristics (size, population, climate, geographical position, economy, etc.) in order to widen the results of the analysis and test the robustness of the methodology. Indeed, it gave a quantitative dimension to the primary energy consumption and CO2 emissions for 2018, compared with the 2005 baseline values, and the final results are related to the reduction commitments planned for 2020. All the municipalities were considered to have achieved this goal, surpassing the 20% emissions reduction. This validated methodology is also the basis for the development of the Sustainable Energy and Climate Action Plans (SECAPs), which integrate adaptation actions and mitigation ones.

The increasing attention and sensitivity to issues related to Global Warming and Climate Change are strengthening the actions and policies related to Sustainable Development trying to give to this concept a clearer engineering dimension. Not only policymakers are involved in this aim and experts of interdisciplinary aspects but also the irreplaceable involvement of citizens which with their behavior can make the difference and get much closer to the seventeen goals of the sustainable development by 2030. In this framework, the Territorial Energetic and Environmental Planning provides operational solidity to the concept of Sustainable Development, giving more responsibility to local administrations (as it is due according to subsidiarity), with the Central Government that guarantees the respect of the principles of Subsidiarity and Glocalization. Province of L’Aquila (in the Abruzzo Region, Italy) has been a leading player of this program and, in 2012, has realized the ambitious goal of having favored a Covenant, joining all the 108 Municipalities of the Province. Department of Industrial and Information Engineering and Economics (DIIIE) of the University of L’Aquila designed the Sustainable Energy Action Plants (SEAP) and the monitoring phase of all the Municipalities through a scientific methodology which matched the goal of SEAPs with the dimension of the Municipality. In order to go deep into SEAP’s analysis, in this paper Authors describes the second uploading and necessary steps: a quantitative analysis of the Baseline Emission Inventory, the quantification of the SEAPs planning actions and the definition of the Monitoring Emission Inventory. This second step was done for the Municipality of Avezzano, one of the main Municipality of the L’Aquila Province, and gave the quantitative dimension of the CO2 emissions referred to the year 2017, compared with 2005 baseline emissions. The reduction commitments to be reached in 2020 defines the present distance to the target.

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Reforestation is the appropriate natural tool to mitigate the climate change. The authors illustrate how to manage cuts and plantations of trees making profit from unused lands, to reach different carbon capture goals. Unused lands, moreover, are frequently in the neighbouring of Municipalities which often are politically responsible of these territories. Their destination as carbon sink inside the implementation of the Sustainable Energy and Climate Action Plans (SECAPs) is particularly suitable, participating in a synergic way to reduce the CO2 municipal emissions by 55 % in 2030 with respect to the 1990 datum. In the framework of a SECAP, this level is mandatory and participates to the common huge effort to decarbonize energy needs. After having modelled some intrinsic aspects related to the dynamics of the carbon capture due to the growth of trees, the research demonstrated how, with a proper management of cuts and plantations, a new concept of mutualism between city and territory can be designed, recognizing the crucial role of neighbouring unused lands alongside those direct actions usually implemented to reduce the carbon intensity of a city.

Single-use plastic is having a significant environmental impact and its reduction is a mandatory step to reduce plastic pollution worldwide. Indeed, the time that a plastic item can persist in the environment is very long and it is well known that it can produce devastating effects in particular in seas and oceans. Moreover, production, use and disposal of plastic items have a significant impact also on the greenhouse effect; this can be estimated in a life cycle approach, by evaluating their carbon footprint. In this work, a review of the carbon footprint evaluation of different single-use plastic categories has been carried out, developing a methodology to immediately evaluate the benefits related to their substitution with compostable and bio-plastic and/or multiple-use items and materials. The result of the novel methodology developed is a certain number of matrixes, which can categorize impact values in order to compare them with replacement with bio-based plastic materials or multi-use things. Finally, the methodology was tested and validated through a case study, where a plastic reduction plan was proposed and implemented and the CO2 equivalent reduction was assessed, demonstrating a reduction potential related to a replacement by bioplastic or other materials equal, respectively, to 73% and 90%.